The Art of Giving Back

In summer 2020, Entertainment Arts Junior and burgeoning game designer Justin Summersett was set to volunteer with the CCS Precollege Summer Experience, which helps high school students develop their talents and interests and earn college credit in the process. Participating in a summer art project is one of the requirements of his Detroit Dream Scholarship, but Summersett, who had attended the summer program when he was in high school, was personally motivated to pay forward some of the mentoring and guidance he had received.

The global coronavirus pandemic had other ideas.

“I was put in a situation where I had to think about how I could give back to my community in a different way,” Summersett explained. “That made me think about how I could start streaming my art and help anyone in the community get a better understanding of game design as a whole.”

The result was “Homework & Chill,” a two-hour stream in which Summersett took viewers along while he solved his own game design challenges. It was an imaginative response to the most unlikely of situations. He still streams every Saturday.

“Once I had participated in the [Precollege] program, I knew I wanted to help students find their footing in art,” he said. “Even if it’s not in game design, I wanted to help them explore different avenues. Over the summer I was going to help facilitate some classes, but Covid-19 put a halt to that. “Homework & Chill” is a way to give back to my community but do it in the way I know how. That’s a core value of my life. I love helping people and seeing smiles on people’s faces. It’s a thing that should be a part of everyone’s life.”

An initiative of Say Detroit, founded by Mitch Albom, the Detroit Dream Scholarships provide full, four-year and partial awards to the College for Creative Studies. Since 2011, more than $500,000 has been awarded to 19 students from Detroit.

Prior to receiving the award, Summersett was working three jobs and attending CCS part-time. “Now I’ve been able to cut back drastically on all of my jobs. I can focus on my art, produce my work and hone my skills to develop my portfolio”

Summersett hopes his portfolio will land him one of the highly competitive game design internships he’s applied for. It’s the homestretch of a dream he’s held since he was a freshman at Henry Ford Academy (HFA), a college-prep high school located within The Henry Ford just outside of Detroit. It was his art teacher at HFA, Darren Sipos, who first put CCS on Summersett’s radar. “I loved video games and I loved art,” he said, “and game design was a perfect melding of the two.

“I knew that game design as a career was possible. And I knew that if CCS was offering it, it’s definitely viable because CCS alums and graduates are spoken of highly in the community here in Detroit. I just thought, ‘I’m going to give it my best shot, and I’m going to learn as much as I can from the school.’”

Fast forward to life as an Entertainment Arts Game student, and Summersett has found his niche —building environments, which he says offer more storytelling potential. “I get to tell more of a story putting trees in a certain area, for example, using certain colors, or designing things in a way that catch your eye and make you go, ‘Oh, this is really cool!’”

But even as he ponders future internships or life after CCS as a game designer, Summersett knows that using his skills to help others will be a part of whatever he does.

“Even if it’s just a five-minute slot out of your day where you offer a quick art tip, it’s still giving back. You never know: what you say or do could impact someone who becomes the next big thing, the next big artist who makes a groundbreaking contribution.”